We bring you the ways to Get MGM Mlife Status for Free, learn all the NYC Subway Map Secrets, address the Global Inequality Gap, learn about all the new airline routes in 2020, gag about the restaurant that only serves airplane food, learn about the fast food chains in the US, dreadfully sad stats about Long Term Care, we dive into the Deep Sea, the amazing story how two bank employees in China pulled off a huge bank robbery that earned them a bullet in their heads, a very sad class of 2000 in an Ohio town decimated by drugs, the huge hurt laid by Trump on the war against the Foreign Service that will take a very long time to recover from and some of my miles burning exploits along with a band recommendation. Enjoy and make a few clicks all right? I could be doing other things with my time, thanks!
TBB Blog Mission: To Educate. Entertain. Inspire. In That Order!
Support TBB by applying for CREDIT CARDS and visiting our LINKS!
MILES & POINTS
Great reference for new routes to use some of your miles and points at last 🙂 New Airline Routes Will Open Great Travel Possibilities in 2020.
If you have some Hyatt elite status, you can match it to MGM Mile High Mlife status. You can get some freebies this way!
TRAVEL
There is a restaurant now that only serves airplane food. WTF, really?
This is a great piece on New York City’s subway map! The New York City Subway Map Like You’ve Never Seen It Before.
Running low on Miles & Points links as expected due to the weekend. And also low on Travel links too. So, here is a great infographic on The Biggest Fast Food Chains In America. There are almost double the number of Subway locations and its sales are less than one third when compared to McDonalds, wow! I also never heard of Wingstop. What does this have to do with Travel you may ask. Valid point! This link is a perfect lead in to this next link: Locations of America’s Biggest Pizza Chains. Just in case you wanted to have some pizza lol. And please do not eat 40 pizzas like this guy bwahahahaha.
PERSONAL FINANCE
Amazing statistics in this article! Must-Know Statistics About Long-Term Care: 2019 Edition. Just a few to get an idea what you will find in it:
145%: Percentage increase in the number of people who died from Alzheimer’s dementia, 2000-17.
-9%: Percentage decrease in the number of people who died from heart disease, 2000-17.
8-10 years: Average life expectancy following an Alzheimer’s diagnosis.
2.8 years: Average length of time between when symptoms begin and when an Alzheimer’s dementia diagnosis is made.
We keep hearing more about the inequality gap. This is a really great piece on it: The Global Inequality Gap, and How It’s Changed Over 200 Years. And this chart is worth a thousand words!
ODDZ & ENDZ
This is a must click. The Deep Sea. What lives down there, WOW!
I despise all forms of gambling. It’s a long story, maybe one day I will blog about it. Anyway, this is a really wild story! Jackpot How two lottery-crazed bank clerks cooked up China’s biggest bank robbery of all time. How can they be so stupid, wow! Well, they were found guilty of course. And executed.
I have read some sad articles about the pain of drug addiction. But this one is just one that had composed and just had to sit down. The Class of 2000. What a giant waste huh?
You need to understand the severe damage that has been taking place in the US Foreign Service! Trump Is Waging War on America’s Diplomats.
BLOG BUZZ
We are now entering BLOG BUZZ, a section for advanced hobbyists and veterans of this fast imploding hobby and also a section where I go on and on about some stuff that happens in my life because it helps me feel better about myself.
If you could distill the essence of BoardingArea and ThePointsGuy into a Reddit post. MUST CLICK. If you do not laugh, something is probably wrong with you 🙂 It has to do with the “amazing” IHG Rewards Platinum status, LOL!
Been trying to get to Cancun on a very short notice (like…next week!) and some observations: Airfare is very expensive. Only Delta and Spirit fly direct out of Detroit. Using Delta Skymiles gets some totally ridiculous award prices…as expected. I don’ t want to use Spirit as I do not want to pay and I would rather not get stranded. Amazingly, we can find awards using AA miles but the routing is brutal…as in overnight in Charlotte or Chicago. And wasting all day on the return with multi hour layovers in Miami or Dallas. Will keep checking. Goal was to try to burn some World of Hyatt points at the Zilara resort…I have not even checked if it is available yet. If not, I have plenty of points to burn…Mrs. TBB wants beach time she says!
My left glute/ass is healed, back to running again. I will be retiring from full time position in my “Gasping For Air” soccer team in 2020, end of an era. But I can’t afford injuries any more as the healing time is WAY too long!
Trying to follow up my NYC Conrad free night during the holidays with a night at The Plaza #developing.
Best music I heard lately is the album Dogrel by the Irish Band Fontaines D.C. The tracks, Big/Too Real/Hurricane Laughter/Chequeless Reckless are great. The singer reminds of me of Ian Curtis of the legendary band Joy Division. Here is the song Big live! LOVE this part of the lyrics below.
My childhood was small But I’m gonna be big
Hey, this is no Justin Bieber like crap around here. TBB does not conform to Top 40 commercial crap 🙂 Screw it, here is another one by the Fontaines D.C. “Too Real“.
And I leave you with this…
TBB
travelbloggerbuzz@gmail.com
Follow TBB on Twitter @FlyerTalkerinA2.
You can subscribe to TBB below, winners only!
Opinions expressed here are author’s alone, not those of any bank, credit card issuer, hotel, airline, or other entity. This content has not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by any of the entities included within the post.
Gold hopefully from Belgium. I don’t settle for Bronze like someone else on this continent.
Some folks are not as competitive, I guess, or are happy with whatever medal they get! 🙂
Have yet to get to Belgium, but it is on the “someday” list!
Carl,
I have been waiting to get gold from Europe just for you. I told wife we can go home now because we got gold from you. See George? Does TPG harbor this kind of unhealthy competition between his commenters? I think not!
We only harbor healthy competition applying for Chase credit cards between our commenters, thanks.
I didn’t realize what benefits came with IHG credit card Patinum status! Wow. And here I was pleased to get the new phone insured.
TBB helps you live large!
Just tweeted these two Hyatt related questions:
1. For Hyatt elite status: Doing $5k on the Hyatt card gives 2 elite nights. What if you do the spend in December 2019 but statement does NOT close until early January 2020…For which year will the 2 elite nights be awarded?
2. For the Hyatt Brand Explorer free night….do award nights count?
Anyone?
Zeroing in on burning miles/points to Cancun Hyatt Zilara resort today…
Answer to question #2 is a definite yes. I am at 4 brands so with Zilara possible I will earn one more night…so many free nights you guys 🙂
Cancun Hyatt Zilara has remarkably good food considering it’s all inclusive. The pool is a bit shallow which makes the water warm. The only negative is the wine you receive in your room. You can find better for $3 at Aldi. I want to go back.
Interestingly, Hyatt has been planning to build a 10+ story hotel in Barbados. It was supposed to be a Centric, but now it will be a Ziva. We’ll see how that goes. There’s a giant Caribbean graveyard fill with hotel plans that didn’t pan out.
Thanks for the info. Excited to be burning some miles/points. Still need one more night in Cancun, the final night…
Re question 1, I have been researching this pretty diligently, and it looks to me that all of the intelligible reports (various threads) on FT suggest that closing date is irrelevant (except for when your stays are officialized). If the spend has a post date in 2019, it will trigger nights counting for 2019, if you go over a $5,000 threshhold.
If I’m wrong — if I’m misreading things, if someone else has experience to the contrary from last year — please correct me. If you look in the comments section of yesterday’s FM Hyatt post, Greg replies to someone in a way that makes me think he thinks that the closing date determines the year. So there are other opinions on this out there.
On Twitter they replied that the statement closing date will determine the year.
“They” also say:
World of Hyatt Tier-Qualifying Night credits will be credited to the calendar year in which the spend occurred.
https://creditcards.chase.com/travel-credit-cards/world-of-hyatt-credit-card
Look, you (“they”) could be right, but as you’ll note in the FT wiki for the WoH card, folks’ experience with some of these things differs from what some of us are told by Chase CSRs. So right now we seem to have FT reports from last year and at least one version of the T&C going one way, and a Twitter response from (Chase? Hyatt?) going the other.
What? After those awesome tips from your guest/ghostwriter last week you couldn’t score domestic awards??? 😉
I want to preserve my United and Sinapore miles stash…Otherwise, it would be easy peasy 🙂
Aluminum From PDX
FREE MY MAN RAMSEY!!!
+1
Make a note not to include several outside links in a comment to avoid anti spam software automatically censor such comments. Without human intervention!
Hey Buzz,
Is that Mommy Points on vocals at TPG awards last night? I knew she could pump the plastic but she’s really getting down there. Good thing she got back from Bora Bora in time to take the mic. It wouldn’t have been the same with Richard Kerr.
And is that song called “Bonvoy”?
https://twitter.com/mclamagna/status/1204428518551146496
Multi talented pumper, who knew? 🙂